Jerry Kramer hopes trip helps Vietnam vets

Former Packer Jerry Kramer interviews a veteran in front of the U.S. Marine Corps War Memorial for an upcoming documentary on the Never Forgotten Honor Flight.(Photo: Nathan Phelps/ USA TODAY NETWORK - Wisconsin)

The offensive lineman, who played 11 seasons with the Packers, has seen the impact of the cold homecoming of decades past. He talks about a friend who was shot four or five times in Vietnam and was spit on when he got home.

“I saw this as an attempt to ease some of the pain for some of the Vietnam veterans, I thought maybe this could heal things a little bit,” Kramer said. “I thought if they could see the monuments, memorials, and all the things that have been erected for them … and maybe hear the cheers of a few folks along the way … it might help a little bit.”

Kramer spent much of the day chatting with veterans, on and off camera, and sharing his own stories about playing under Vince Lombardi and in the Ice Bowl. But the focus of the day was on the men and women who served their country.

“It’s such a difficult world they have existed in where chance and randomness seems to reign,” Kramer said. “A guy was telling me about a fella who was there three days and got killed. Then the next guy might be there for three years, so you never know. You live in that uncertainty.”

Throughout the trip, the veterans were accepted and treated respectfully as veterans by strangers they encountered.

Russell Iwin of Merrill served with the Marines in Vietnam in the 1965 and 1966 and said the reaction of the public stands in stark contrast to attitudes of decades past.

“When you get off here you get a handshake, you get hugged, cheered on,” he said. “Not in ’66.”

Four decades after the end of the Vietnam War the reception and attitude about the people who served there has shifted.

“I don’t understand how anyone could do what we did early on,” Kramer said about the treatment of Vietnam veterans in the '60s and '70s. “I see the young kids today and they want to take a picture and they were applauding, and happy. There wasn’t anyone demonstrating or calling them names. Maybe we’re past that point and maybe we’re past the Vietnam War, finally.”

Chronicling the journey

USA TODAY NETWORK-Wisconsin is partnering with Never Forgotten Honor Flight and former Green Bay Packers Jerry Kramer to produce a video of the trip that will debut in December. Former Packers fullback John Kuhn traveled with veterans last May and hosted a video chronicling that flight.

A showing of a 30-minute film from 2016 is set for May 29 at the Cosmo Theater in Merrill. Admission to the 5 p.m. show is $5 with net proceeds supporting Never Forgotten Honor Flight.

Also, USA TODAY NETWORK-Wisconsin is again featuring weekly letters home from veterans from Memorial Day through Veterans Day as part of the Honoring Our Freedom Series. Letters and recollections of the homefront can be submitted online at the Honoring Our Freedom website.